Volvo and Polestar Will Lastly Begin Designing EVs Individually

In case your first thought upon seeing the brand new 2024 Volvo EX90 wasn’t, “Holy shit, lidar!” it was in all probability one thing like, “Cling on, didn’t I see this already?” The EX90 shares its platform and powertrain with the Polestar 3, the electrical SUV that Volvo’s spinoff model debuted in October. However past the mechanical bits, the 2 Swedes look comparable — too comparable, maybe. Fortunately, in line with Volvo’s design chief, this Polestar parity gained’t be round for much longer.

“We’ve break up the studio,” Robin Web page, Volvo’s head of design and consumer expertise, informed members of the media in the course of the EX90’s debutante ball in Stockholm this week. “The Polestar crew are [now] in a separate constructing.”

Why the breakup? All of it comes all the way down to the legislation. Web page mentioned that, following Polestar’s IPO, the 2 firms “legally” wanted to separate their design groups. “We labored in the identical studio for Polestar 1, 2 and three,” Web page mentioned. “With Polestar 3 we began to develop the Polestar design crew, however after the IPO is once we break up them.”

A fast refresher: The Polestar 1 was basically a road-going model of the completely attractive 2013 Volvo Coupe idea, and the Polestar 2 is mainly a manufacturing model of the Volvo 40.2 idea from 2016. That the Volvo EX90 and Polestar 3 are so intently associated is hardly a shock primarily based on this historical past.

Will issues change going ahead? “Yeah, completely,” Web page mentioned. “Each manufacturers have very robust design identities [and] we will simply break up our design languages.” Even for these new SUVs, Web page factors out that the Polestar is a five-seater and the EX90 can seat seven. “It’s not like we’re doing the identical proportions.”

That bodes properly for the upcoming Polestar 5 — a super-slick EV primarily based on 2020’s Principle idea automobile. Images of the prototype have already proved the 5 gained’t appear like any Volvo that’s come earlier than. And with a supposed 884 horsepower on faucet, you finest consider it gained’t drive like one, both.